Hypocrisy
by Tigereyes45
Summary: Arya manages to convince Sandor to come with her. The one thing she had failed to do with Syrio all those years ago. Now they must escape the Red Keep and survive Daenery's attack on the city together to make it back to their loved ones.


_This story is requested by tidalwaveofcats on Tumblr. Their request was Sandor not dying in a stupid situation like he did and going back to Sansa!_

* * *

As he speaks the words, Sandor feels the regret building up. The look in her eyes slowly morphs into understanding. He thinks it is the first time he ever saw that look on Arya's face. All those lessons all those days, and never once did she ever look at him the way she was now. Even when they thought he was dying, and she had to go. Her face was never this soft.

"Then come with me."

"That's not how this works," Sandor scoffs letting go of Arya's face.

She looks at the floor and shakes her head. "You say revenge is all that's motivated you, but you weren't looking for vengeance when you fought for me! When you offered to take my sister away from this awful place! You can live without killing him!" Arya shouts. Pieces of the roof fall down around them, almost as if it agreed with her.

"What would I do then, girl? Live in the North? Freeze my balls off every day angry and hateful."

"You've always been hateful, but if I shouldn't die here why should you?!"

"Because he is my brother! Yours is waiting for you back home."

Arya shakes her head and hugs Sandor. "I can't go back alone." She whispers as her arms loosen around him.

Sandor sighs and bends down so he was eye-level with her. She lets go of him only for him to now hug her. She laughs, "You really must be about to die,"

"Shut up." He growls. He watches as the dragon flies above them. It's fire reigning down on one of the towers. "We need to go."

Arya's eyes squint as she looks back at the Hound. '"What? I said we didn't I?" He pushes her away before grabbing her hand. He flips around and decides that the way they came would be the safest route out.

As he leads the youngest Stark daughter out of the Red Keep he couldn't help but reflect. Ghosts were everywhere here. Around every corner, a new scene would begin to play out before them. Where Sansa had been mocked, when Joffrey had taken her to see her father's head. Where the imp had interrupted them. Where he had watched Petyr twist her. Where the queen had mocked her. Everywhere he looked was just another reason for him to keep running. For him to return to the cursed north. Fucking hell, why did he listen to Arya?

As they make it out of the castle all hell came down on them. The Hound pulls Arya closer as he walks them through a back alley. He pulls her along as a swarm of commoners surround them. He can feel her slipping behind as she holds his hand tighter than before. When she trips Sandor almost falls with her. He pushes the people around them away. He sets his arms under her and lifts her up. Resting Arya's bruised head under his neck. Perhaps it was a good thing he had left with her. She would be one less ghost to haunt him. Sandor runs faster as the world comes crashing down on them. He ignores the screams of the less fortunate, and his fear of the fire only allowed him to push himself further. He would get her out of this. He feels something hit his shoulder. He tucks her head back under his neck. When his head is hit next Sandor falls. He wraps his arms around Arya's small body as his own collapses.

* * *

When next Sandor opened his eyes he was buried under rubble. A small source of light breaking in from somewhere to his right. He tries to stand but his feet were being held down. He moves his hands only to feel Arya was still in them. Her face was clear in the light. She was covered in white ash and a bit of blood from near her shoulder. Otherwise, she seemed unharmed. He rests his own forehead against hers and listens closely.

As breath escapes from her nose he could feel his heartbeat slow. She was still alive.

"Don't die on me yet." He asks her he tucks her deeper into himself. He pushes his back up and towards the back. Making sure that any rubble on them would fall away instead of in front of them. A fire erupts in his shoulder as he moves it. Sandor bites his lip and growls. Arya stirs as he shakes the last of the rubble off. He looks back to see why he couldn't move his legs. There was more brick on them than anything else.

"Stay still she-wolf." He warns her in a low growl. He wraps one hand under her body to hold her to him. His left reaches back to tear the bricks off of him.

"S-Sandor?" Arya's voice was quiet almost inaudible as he continues to try and dig them out.

"Shush now she-wolf. Save your strength." He advises as his knuckles break against the bricks. He ignores the blood and keeps trying. His limbs scream out at him as every move is faster than the last. He would get them out of here. He would get them back to the North!

"Jon," Arya whispers, and for a moment Sandor stops. He looks up to see her bastard brother was indeed there. A bit of a way down the street from them. Northmen and unsullied at his back.

"Bastard!" Sandor shouts causing the man to jump. "Snow!" He calls out this time and the Jon finally looks at him. Not just in his direction. "I've got the she-wolf bastard!" He shouts and now Jon as running to him. The closer he got the wider his eyes got. Just like a doe who was about to be hunted down. Sandor hated these direwolves. The women were all too fierce and the men were all does, wide-eyes and never where they were needed.

"Take the she-bitch, she needs to get out of here." Sandor orders as Jon drops to his knees on top of the rubble next to them.

"Arya! What was she doing here?" Jon asks as he takes her from the Hound.

"Nevermind what she was doing here! Get her home!" Sandor orders as he pulls himself out of the rest of the way.

Jon looks from Arya back towards the Red Keep. His eyes squint as he puts the pieces together. "Was she in the Red Keep?"

"We were. Now move you dumb cunt." Sandor orders as he lifts Jon up by the back of his armor. "We need to get her out of here!"

"The attacks stopped. Daenerys has won." Jon explains as he carries Arya behind the Hound. "We can get you two into the Red Keep where the Queen is staying. Your injuries can be tended to there."

Sandor spits to the corner and ignores the amount of blood that was in his saliva. "That queen or yours is vicious." He looks back up towards the army marching towards the demolished Red Keep. "I'll stay near the little wolf. Less she try to bring another building down upon her again."

"We didn't know you were here. You two weren't supposed to be here." Jon growls back.

Sandor rolls his eyes and glares down at the bastard Snow. "Does that excuse her bringing them down upon everyone else. Because they weren't part of your little pack?"

He looks back down at Arya in Jon's arms. If he was better he would already have taken her back. Her head was nestled comfortably in his chest. She was finally back in the arms of her favorite brother. For once Arya seemed perfectly at peace. It pissed him off, but he knew it was best. Jon could keep her safe. Get her back North where she belongs. All he was good for was guarding her, and even when he was doing that he had lost her once and she almost died the second time.

"N-no it doesn't but,"

Sandor growls at him before snapping out. His teeth physically jump towards Jon to silence him. He was done listening. They both needed to be seen. That was most important right now. Not whatever squabbling and nitpicking the boy had for his queen's actions.

"Keep talking and I'll take her back from yer scrawny ass. She needs to be looked at. Now,"

Jon instinctively moves towards his sword. Even if he was unable to pull it out with his hands full. Sandor notices and only laughed. The boy thought himself such a hero that he could take him on with the she-wolf in his grip. A fool as brave as his little sister. If not as smart. Sandor turns back around and shouts for directions to the closest medic from the unsullied.

* * *

When Sansa arrived Sandor was by Arya's side. The young she-wolf had been up and moving within hours after the city was taken, but after her brother killed his queen she was the only Stark free in the city. So Sandor was always just a few steps behind her. Making her presence known to all. Much to the annoyance of the trained killer. She had grown to enjoy living in silence and shadows. In a way, a lumbering dog could never do.

When the red wolf arrived a few cheered. All of the Targaryen forces were grim-faced. Arya stood at the top of the stairs leading to the Red Keep to meet her sister. Ready to inform her of Daenerys' death and their brother's imprisonment. As Sansa approaches them, Bran being carried up the steps behind her, her face told them she already knew. Sandor looks at Bran to see him give a gentle nod towards Arya. The boy had strange abilities unlike those of anyone else he had ever met. It made him feel uneasy. The only comfort was knowing that he would never dare use such abilities against his sisters. That may be the only thing keeping Sandor nearby as the three Starks reunite once again.

Sandor takes note of Arya's apparent preoccupied attention. She kept looking past her family towards the carriages. Her brother notices as well. For once he was next to her he pulls on her sleeve and whispers in her ear. Sandor tries to listen in, but Sansa steps in between him and the youngest Starks.

"It is good to see that you lived Ser Sandor. Having realized my sister's sudden absence was concerning. When I heard you were with her down here it relieved a bit of my anxiousness." She smiles and it causes him to pause.

"Cut the shit, you were never worried. The she-bitch is the fiercest fighter in the Seven Kingdoms."

Sansa smiles and for a second his ear picks up on a brief laugh. It was short but oh so sweet. "That is true. Perhaps it was someone else's absence I felt concern from then."

He shakes his head and holds back a laugh. "Beguiling words are your new sweet song, aye Lady Stark?" He looks back up to see the shock on her face. "Weren't expecting that were you?"

"Nor was I expecting to find you alive, or with my little sister." Sansa retorts as the shock fades. She returns to her stony expression, but Sandor saw the little curve of her lips. There on her, hidden under cold blue eyes, and blood red hair that outlined her face was the faintest of smiles. A smile only a dog could see. A smile just for him as her song had been once.

"Sister a council will be meeting soon now that you have arrived. Uncle and the Prince of Dorne are already there." Arya speaks looking bewilderedly at her sister.

"Indeed, come, Bran, we should make our way to the rest."

"They will wait. Lord Baratheon is still seeing to the horses before he comes up."

"Well, he is new to lordship while we would have no excuse." Sansa insists. Taking the back of her brother's chair from a Northman. As the Hound and Arya follow the she-wolf offers a questioning glare to him.

"What she-bitch?"

"I saw that." Arya points out accusatory.

"Yes, I have a tongue. I talk unlike you do nowadays. Been following you for weeks now and you've spoken less than you did in one day of our little journey together."

Arya rolls her eyes, and Sandor thought he was looking in a mirror for a moment. She gives Sandor a look that he can only read as a warning. Then she was walking behind her siblings. Sandor was quick to follow in her footsteps.

* * *

After the meeting, he sits on the docks watching Snow being sent off. The scene would have felt heartbreaking to many. All the Starks were finally together again after all the trauma and years that had been piled onto their backs. Now they were all being torn asunder again. Snow beyond the wall where all snow belongs. The she-wolf had already made clear her intentions to leave behind Westeros. Sandor did feel a pang upon hearing this. For some reason, he knows that whether if she means it to be permanent or not that it will be. Bran was king. A fucking cripple was king. Sandor wasn't sure if he was the first cripple to be king but he would be the first fucking Stark to rule in King's Landing.

And then there was Sansa. As she hugs Jon he wonders if he had ever seen her so open with anyone else. So completely herself the way she was with her family. Then he remembers that there was a time she had been. Back in King's Landing before her father died. While Ned Stark's name alone could still protect her. When she was free before the cage fell around her. Eventually, it had collapsed in on her. Somehow the little bird had picked herself free. Now she was returning North with a crown upon her head and no family or even a knight by her side to protect her. A lone bird with the fur of a red wolf.

As Snow departs and the Starks stroll back to shore Sandor remains seated. He had found the cold stones of the wall by the docks comfortable. After so much rubble had sat on top of him it was nice to sit on top of something that would eventually be nothing but crumpled rock and rubble. He watches the ship carrying Snow sail away as the other Starks depart and separate.

"Will you be going with her?" He doesn't jump when the voice comes from his back. Arya had jumped out of nowhere so many times by now that he had no fear left to give.

"With who?"

"Arya. Will you be sailing West with her?" Sansa asks again to his back.

"Why does the Queen of the North want to know?"

She sits next to him on the wall. For once Sandor actually notices how much taller she had become. Her height was closer to his own now. It only reaffirmed what he already knew. What he knew as soon as he heard the news of Ramsay Bolton's cruelty.

"She may be looking for a Queen's Guard," Sansa suggests coyly.

"What about the behemoth of the woman that was with you? The blonde from Tarth?" He asks finally looking at her. Not past her, or by her, but right at her. He allows his eyes to hover on her face. On the way, her blue eyes moved with mirth. The way her lips quiver as her breath escapes with every outtake.

"She is going to stay and become commander of the Kingsguard. So will you be joining my sister?" Sansa asks again this time meeting his gaze.

"Yes, will you be joining my sister?" Arya asks as she appears besides Sansa.

Sandor looks at her dryly. "I don't have to join anyone. I could say fuck all and leave." He points out. It's just barking. He knows he would never abandon them both. Not again, not with a choice.

"You won't though." Arya smiles as she basically voices his thoughts out loud. Sansa looks to Arya before glancing back and forth between them. Confusion evident where before she had seemed accepting.

"Aye I won't," Sandor admits and Sansa looks at him again. Her cold face having returned. He looks to Arya and for once felt nothing but pride.

"I'm sorry Little Wolf, but what's out there," he stops and looks out to the sea. "What's out there I can't protect you from."

"It's fine Sandor." He looks up to see the Little Wolf stood in front of him. Her wound already healing up. "You've protected me enough." She wraps her arms around him. Without thinking he wraps his own around her and squeezes tight. "Keep her safe for me Sandor," Arya whispers in his ear.

"Aye." He promises, holding her tighter. "Make sure to come back alive. Or I fucking hunt you down myself!" This time he makes his promises a little louder. Earning him a firm hand on his shoulder from the other Stark.

As Arya lets him go she dashes down the docks. Not even looking back towards them. Never even bothering to go back and say goodbye to the smith before. "She's a cold bitch."

"Not as cold as you may think." Sansa corrects leaning against him.

As Sandor realizes that the smith was already on her ship, Sansa kisses his cheek. "I think you'll grow used to the cold Sandor."

He rests his own hand on top of hers. Presses her fingers even deeper into his shoulder. "Aye, I might."


End file.
